It’s been nine months since South Korea changed its local brewing laws to allow for more competition in its notoriously flavorless beer market.

A quick look around this holiday season suggests the new rules have had an impact on Korea’s fledgling craft beer scene, though there are still plenty of complaints about slow changes in regulation — and worries about the encroachment of South Korea’s sprawling chaebols. Read More »

South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety has warned about the number of calories in the rice cakes known as songpyeon, a traditional favorite on the Chuseok holiday.

European Pressphoto Agency

Obesity rates in South Korea may be among the lowest in the developed world, but the government is still concerned about people stuffing themselves silly during Korea’s equivalent of Thanksgiving. The country’s food safety agency last week issued a special calorie-intake guideline for traditional holidays. Read More »

A van crash that killed K-pop star Go Eun-bi earlier this week claimed a second death on Sunday.

Ladies’ Code singer Kwon Ri-se, 23, was pronounced dead at around 10 a.m. at a hospital in the Seoul suburb of Suwon, after failing to recover from surgery, according to local media citing her agents. Read More »

South Korea’s birthrate last year fell to the lowest level on record, the government said Tuesday, just days after the release of a study warning that South Koreans could face natural extinction by 2750.

Just 8.6 babies per 1,000 South Koreans were born last year, the lowest level since the country began keeping records in 1970, the national statistics agency said. In 1970, there were 31.2 babies born per thousand people. Read More »

That’s the message from Boryeong, a South Korean city that holds a giant annual mud-wrestling contest known more formally as the Boryeong Mud Festival, to the people of Buñol, a small Spanish town that holds an annual tomato-slinging food fight known as La Tomatina. Read More »

About Korea Real Time

Korea Real Time provides sharp analysis and insight into what’s making news on the Korean peninsula. We chronicle the growing pains of South Korea — a country that has skyrocketed into the club of the world’s richest nations but now faces significant headwinds, and shine a spotlight on one of the world’s biggest geopolitical flashpoints: North Korea. Drawing on the expertise of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires, we’ll tell the stories behind the headlines in business, economics, politics, culture and lifestyle. You can contact the editors at korearealtime@wsj.com